


The Water is Wide

by cofax



Series: This is Not Wartime [5]
Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: AU, Apocafic, Gen, This is Not Wartime
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-09
Updated: 2010-03-09
Packaged: 2017-10-07 20:00:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/68724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cofax/pseuds/cofax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Why does it feel like you're dying?</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Water is Wide

**Author's Note:**

> Posted July 2004.

You shrug your shoulders under the pack straps. It's not your old field pack, so carefully adjusted for your specific hip-to-shoulder ratio, designed to withstand days of tramping through alien landscapes. This is bright green and blue, some college student's leftovers, and the balance is all wrong.

Kal is ten yards down the trail already, and you scowl as you fiddle with the compression straps at your hips.

"Problem, Carter?" The colonel's voice comes from behind you; you didn't realize he followed you out of camp.

"No, sir, just adjusting the pack." You give up in disgust and unsnap the waist belt. You'll have to repack some of your gear, move the heaviest equipment to the bottom of the pack.

The pack comes off easily: the colonel has lifted it off your back, and he lets it hit the wet ground with a soft thump. "Shouldn't have let Benson pack for you, Carter."

Benson's a lot taller than you are: it makes a difference. You kneel, avoiding the slush along the trail as best you can, and open the pack. "Yes, sir."

"Major?" Kal's waiting for you.

"Go on down, Kal," calls the colonel. "She'll meet you at the trailhead."

With a nod, Kal moves off, his red jacket flickering through the bare birch trunks as he follows the trail downhill. It's only a couple of miles to the trailhead, and you're deep in free countryside here. He's smart, if inexperienced: he'll be fine.

The colonel squats on his heels next to you as you start pulling gear out. You give him a glance before looking back at   
your hands. He looks the same as he has all winter: bearded, tired, closed. You don't remember the last time he smiled at anyone, but then you don't remember smiling much yourself lately either.

Camp stove, extra ammunition, package of C4: those last two are a death sentence if you're caught with it. But you and the colonel decided it was worth the risk. Something else falls to the ground, a small package, and you stare at it blankly. Why did Benson give you a box of condoms?

You blush and glance up at the colonel: there's a dimple forming behind the salt-and-pepper bristles. "Something you wanted to tell me, Carter?"

"No, sir! It was Benson, I guess--"

He shrugs, the dimple fading. "Good to be prepared, anyway. Might come in useful for trade."

"Yeah." You stuff it into one of the side pockets, and zip it shut. The camp stove, cartridges, and all the heavy gear you stow in the bottom of the pack. The clothes--all civilian, incriminating labels removed--and the sleeping bag are   
piled above that, crushed as tight as you can force them. The dried meat, crackers, and camping meals are stashed on top in a small stuffsack. You clip your water bottles to the outside--canteens are too military--and pick the pack up by the strap on the top. It seems more stable.

When you stand up, the colonel does too, and he holds the pack while you shrug it over your shoulders. You haven't figured out why he followed you out of camp. You made your farewells around the fire pit, to Benson, Teal'c, Jones and Hernandez. That was hard enough: you don't want to do it again.

You buckle the waist belt, bounce a little bit. It's much more secure, the weight settling on your hips now. You know you can walk a long way like this. Hopefully not all the way to Aberdeen: you don't have time to walk if you're going to make your rendezvous.

"Carter," the colonel says, and pulls you around to face him. He tugs at the shoulder straps of your pack. "That good?"

"Yes, sir, it's fine."

You're not happy about leaving him here. It will just be him and Teal'c now, and tomorrow Teal'c leaves to chase a rumor of disaffected Jaffa outside Washington. But the colonel can't leave, the colonel is the center point of the web. He's the one who knows what to do, the one with the contacts, the one everyone trusts. He stays here in the woods, and sends everyone else out into the field of fire.

You've known him for six years, and you know he's not happy about that either. He moves his hands from your pack straps to your shoulders, and shakes you a little. You feel the pressure, but no warmth through the layers of fleece and wool. You're used to the cold now.

"Do me a favor, okay?" His eyes drill into yours, his strong hands squeezing harder than he realizes, pinching against the bones of your upper arms. He swallows, and the skin under his jaw moves convulsively.

Nodding, you say, "Anything, sir." Because you will, you realize. Anything.

It hurts to breathe.

"_Don't die._" He shakes you a little more, and if you didn't know better, if this weren't the colonel who you've known for six years and who doesn't cry, ever, you might think he was on the edge of tears. "You hear me?"

You're going to cross a hundred miles of conquered country to meet someone who might, just might, put you in contact with the last remnant of the US Army on this coast. You will steal a car, and drive by night, and dodge Jaffa patrols and feral goa'uld and your own people--some of whom are desperate and some of whom are starving. And some of whom will turn you in for the chance to get just one day out of the labor camps.

"I hear you, sir." You can't help it: you can't reach his hands like this, but you can grip his shoulder, run your hand up his neck to his face. Your hands are cold and his skin is warm and his beard is soft against your fingers.

Then he pulls you forward, and he hugs you, as much of you as he can reach with your pack and his weapon in the way. He holds you like that for a long time, and it's not like the other hugs, the moments you've shared in the aftermath of horror or grief. This isn't comfort, it's not even affection.

You think it's fear, and your arms close more tightly around him, your eyes blink against the scratchy wool of his sweater. He smells sour, of old sweat and dirt and the reek of the campfire. You wish, oh you wish. But your wishes start with the day Daniel solved the Stargate and a thousand days since then. There's no way out, only through.

He lets you go as you straighten up, and meets your eyes ruefully.

"I have to go, sir." He won't be alone: Benson and the others will be here with him. You won't be alone either, nor will Teal'c.

Why does it feel like you're dying?

He steps back from you and nods down the trail, down towards Kal and the highway and the journey east.

"Bring me back an army, Carter."

You come to attention and give him the snappiest salute you can, despite the weight of the pack and the way your throat has closed with grief. "I'll do my best, sir."

And you turn away, and jog down the trail after Kal. You don't look back: you don't want to know if he's watching you leave.

 

END


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